Grief, the emotional response to any loss, can powerfully overwhelm us with a flood of seemingly unending feelings. Grief can incapacitate us, making work and daily life seem meaningless. A grieving heart feels terribly vulnerable: a tender memory of our loved one, or a sad song on the radio can bring on a flood of tears. A grieving heart unfolds itself, releasing unexpressed feelings: anguish, despair, hopelessness.

In grieving, we experience the deep pain of loss. Yet, our loss is not of the other person, rather, we grieve the loss of our relationship with the other person. Our attachment—the emotional energy that we invested in the relationship—has lost its “anchor.” No wonder we feel ungrounded; our reference point for who we are in relation to the other has vanished: We feel that we have lost a part of ourselves. Through grieving, we painfully let go of our ego’s attachment to the relationship and reclaim our sense of Self: We ultimately rediscover that the Source ofour happiness comes from within us.

Loss and grieving offer us a path of opportunity to reawaken our feeling selves and to open our hearts to experience not only anguish, but a broader range of emotions, including true happiness and joy.

Grieving moves us directly into our heart to process the source of our attachments and to find ourselves—again—as the Source of our lives.